The securing of doors against unwanted entry has been a problem as long as there have been doors. Less than honest people are always trying to gain entry to rooms for which they are not authorized. This can lead to criminal activity such as breaking and entering, burglary, or other crimes concerning property and theft. More importantly, unauthorized entry by ill-doers can lead to crimes involving the person and safety of the occupant of the room or building. Consequently, many individuals have become seriously concerned about their personal safety and security.
Such concerns are significantly increased where a person is temporarily occupying a room such as a hotel or motel room. While in their home, they can install multiple locks and alarms, in a hotel or motel, they can only employ the locks provided them, by the establishment, to secure the door to their room or suite. Generally, such locks are electronic or mechanical, but suffer from a significant shortfall in that many employees have pass keys to the room, and it is not unknown that criminals have found codes and devices that will circumvent a locked door and allow them into a room or suite.
As such, there is an unmet need for a portable locking device for securing doors from unauthorized opening to prevent entry into homes, businesses, and especially into hotel rooms and suites. Such a device should be easy to secure to any door, yet provide significant if not total prevention of opening of a secured door, unless disengaged. Such a device should be easily deployed and engaged by a user, but once so engaged should be tamper proof and unremovable by anyone but occupants of the secured room.
Because of the more significant security concerns of users who travel, due to their reliance on the security of the doors and rooms of a hotel or motel, such a device should be configured for easy transport. To that end, such a door securement device should be lightweight so as to not add excess weight to luggage and should be collapsible to a configuration which will easily fit in a conventional suitcase. From this collapsed or stored configuration, such a device must also be easily deployed and engaged to the knob stem of the doors of choice without the need for tools or fasteners or other damaging connections to the door.
In this fashion, upon the arrival of a user at a destination, the device is easily deployed to provide security from unauthorized entry through the door to which it engages, whether the door opener has a knob or handle connected to the stem controlling the lock. Still further, such a device should be easily and quickly disengageable to allow entry for authorized visitors or to allow the exit of the user from the room, especially if there is an emergency.
The forgoing examples of related art of door securement and security and limitations related therewith are intended to be illustrative and not exclusive, and they do not imply any limitations on the invention described and claimed herein. Various other limitations of the related art are known or will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon a reading and understanding of the specification below and the accompanying drawings.